


Cloud City Blues (in Eight Bars)

by hibernate



Category: Doctor Who, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-02-18
Updated: 2010-02-18
Packaged: 2017-10-07 08:49:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/63447
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hibernate/pseuds/hibernate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A city in the clouds. It sounded a lot better in theory.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cloud City Blues (in Eight Bars)

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [Multiverse5000](http://community.livejournal.com/multiverse5000), for the prompt Doctor Who/Star Wars: Donna Noble and Lando Calrissian.

1.

The spot where they had parked the TARDIS earlier was suffering from a rather painful lack of time and space ships. Donna stared at the empty spot in front of her and tried to remember how to breathe. He left her. He bloody left her. That skinny, alien _bastard_.

_You're going to love it, Donna_, he'd said. _A city in the clouds. It's absolutely beautiful!_

Oh, it was beautiful, all right. Obviously the prettiness of the place must have gone to her head, otherwise she'd never have let the biggest trouble magnet in the universe out of her sight.

She was going to kill him. Wring his neck and throw him out in space. No, too kind. She stared into the empty corner where the TARDIS had been standing not long before and considered painful and prolonged methods of killing alien idiots in suits. (She would have to make a list.)

Donna exhaled.

What the hell was she going to do now? All alone in a strange city on the other end of the universe with no way of getting home. Things couldn't possibly be any worse.

* * *

2.

Wrong, Donna Noble! She should have known by now that things could _always_ get worse. Just thinking that they couldn't was inviting trouble in for tea. Or, in this instance, invite security guards in and ask them nicely to please arrest her.

At least they hadn't actually thrown her in prison. Yet.

Quite the opposite, strangely enough. The office they brought her to was _huge_; bigger than any flat she'd ever had (although to be fair, that wasn't saying much), and about a billion times more posh.

The man behind the desk (that was the size of a dinner table for twelve) looked up as they entered, and then stood up, walking towards her. He was all fancy clothes and smoothness, right down to the completely _ridiculous_ cape. Who did he think he was, Superman?

"Where is he?" Cape Boy said.

Oh, wasn't that just _typical_. As if there had been any doubt in her mind that the Doctor was the source of all this.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Donna said icily. "Now let me go, I haven't done anything!"

After a nod from Mr Superhero, one of the guards actually did unlock the handcuffs, although he kept hovering over her in a way that was probably supposed to look threatening. Unfortunately he was rather good at it. Donna straightened her back and raised her chin. She knew better than to be intimidated by something like that. Mostly.

"I'm Lando Calrissian, the Baron-Administrator of Cloud City. There's no point in denying it, we've got you and your husband on our security cameras--"

"He's _not_ my husband," Donna interrupted. That important detail needed to get cleared up right away.

He dismissed her with a wave. "I don't care what your relationship is. You arrived here together. Tell me where he went."

Donna huffed. It wasn't like there was any point in lying. "He... left."

He took a step towards her and eyed her sternly. "Where did he go?"

Donna really hated the fact that he was taller than her. She clamped her teeth together hard and stared darkly back.

"Oh, I see." An insufferably smug look settled on Mr I'm-a-fancy-Baron-Administrator's face. "Abandoned your here when things got rough, did he?"

It was more of a reflex than a conscious decision; before she had the time to consider the wisdom of it, her hand hit his cheek with a deeply satisfying smack.

The look on his face was definitely worth it, even though it made the security guards grab onto her a in a way that wasn't particularly comfortable at all. Cape Boy made another gesture, though, and once again they let her go. "You're lucky I'm not throwing you in a cell, lady," he said. "Just get out of here before I change my mind."

Only problem was, where exactly was she going to go? "Did you forget the part where I was just left alone here with no money or anything?" she said. "You're the boss of this place. What am I gonna do?"

He shrugged. "You seem very resourceful. I'm sure you'll figure something out." He flashed a wide grin at her. "Flip over a new card and start again. We've all been there, honey."

Well, sometimes you needed to be practical. She wasn't going to starve while waiting for that stupid Martian to get back. "I'll work for you," she said quickly. "I can do _loads_ of things."

"Is that so?" His eye line travelled very pointedly across her body to settle somewhere down her blouse.

Stupid, outer-space doors; it took half the satisfaction out of storming out on people when you couldn't slam the door behind you. Bloody alien perverts.

* * *

3.

All right, then. A city this big had to have plenty of other potential employers who'd be lucky to have her. She'd got the powers of persuasion from her mother's side of the family and Cape Boy was right about one thing: she was very resourceful.

Before sunset she'd got herself a job sorting rubbish from the lost and found storage and a miniature one-room flat on level 174, shared with a girl named Loni who had purple tentacles and the most gorgeous, glittering, blue skin. Loni owned in a pub in Port Town and also functioned as some kind of priest on the upper levels - both occupations as far as Donna understood it being fronts for various other activities that it was probably better if she didn't know about.

Cloud City was so much bigger than Donna had thought when she and the Doctor had visited the upper levels.

"The lower levels are just housing the whole technical shebang that keeps us floating," Loni explained. "From level 370 is the tibanna gas refineries and then there're factories up to level 221."

"And then we're up to our levels, right?" Donna said. "First flats, and then Port Town."

"Yep. Port Town, that's where it gets interesting." Loni smiled, revealing pointy teeths and the hint of a dark blue tongue. "Oh, people think Cloud City is all about the hotels and casinos on the upper levels, but Port Town is where it's really happening."

Donna didn't doubt that for a second. At least if by 'happening', she meant smuggling, scams, illegal gambling and various other illegitimate affairs, and she was pretty sure that was exactly what Loni meant.

She wasn't worried about the Doctor.

Angry, yes, but not worried. He'd be back. He wouldn't leave her here. He _wouldn't_.

Only, his driving was terrible. Even if, _when_, he tried to come back he'd still probably just end up on Pluto or something. Where he'd invariably get entangled in some kind of trouble, getting himself killed or worse (if there were worse things, the Doctor would be the one to find them) in the process.

Three weeks in and she was starting to get _really_ angry. If he'd got himself killed she was going to track down his corpse and slap him back to life, so she could kill him again.

Discovering the week before that she was being followed by one of the city's security guards didn't exactly help things. (Oh yes, Lando Calrissian, Mr Look-at-me-I've-got-a-stupid-cape-and-I'm-everyone's-boss, always there to make things that much worse. He seemed like just the kind of type who'd leave his best friend behind if things got hairy. The bastard.) But the security guard must at least mean that he thought the Doctor would come back for her, which was a tiny bit of comfort in all of this.

Not much, though. Cloud City didn't even have coffee.

* * *

4.

She began a letter to Wilf.

There was no way of sending it, of course, but pen on paper was the same everywhere, no matter what substituted for paper in this part of the universe. And maybe if the Doctor finally did come back, but too late, in a hundred years--

She tore it apart.

* * *

5.

At least they had decent drinks in Cloud City. Donna wasn't quite sure what was in them, but they were orange and tasted pleasantly spicy. The pub - the Horny Hutt Cantina; blimey, did Donna ever _not_ want to know where that name came from - was located in one of the better parts of Port Town and almost empty at this time of night. It took her a moment to recognise the grey figure a couple of seats away. Well, it seemed she couldn't quite get away from him, because there he was again, that idiot Calrissian, in what must be the worst disguise ever.

"The beard is an improvement," Donna said and gestured towards the obviously fake, grey beard that looked mostly like a small, scruffy animal had taken up residence on his face.

He just grunted in response. Actually, on closer inspection, he did look a bit like someone had run off with all his money. "Doing secret business here then?" she said. "That's why you're all under-cover? Didn't think I'd ever see you in Port Town."

"Hypothetical question," he said, completely ignoring everything she'd said. "Say you have the ability to make a great deal. It's pretty much the perfect deal."

"No such thing," Donna said. "Next thing you know they'll want your right arm or firstborn or something."

He took a deep swig of his drink. "Yeah. But this is a deal that would solve all your problems and help a lot of people who depend on you."

Donna rolled her eyes. Oh, please. What did he have to worry about? He practically owned a floating city. It wasn't as if he'd been stranded in the wrong end of the universe. "Do I look like a therapist?"

"A what?"

"I don't want to hear about your hypothetical problems. Just stop being an idiot."

He didn't say anything, just sort of slumped forward a bit. That annoying, slick smile never left his face, but he was looking at her with the same pathetic puppy-dog eyes the Doctor had.

Donna sighed deeply and rolled her eyes, moving to sit next to him. Why did it always come down to the sad, pitiful eyes? "So who did you have to shag to get to be the boss of this place?" she said, taking pity on him.

That got him to straighten his back at least. "You know, accusing people of things like that only makes it seem like that's how you get ahead in life. Some people stick to honest methods."

She snorted loudly. "That's how you ended up here? Worked your way up, did you? Somehow I find that hard to believe."

"Doesn't matter. I don't remember."

"Come on, if you can't tell the woman you're having followed, who can you tell? Was it something embarrassing? Did your mum buy it for you?" She laughed loudly. "Oh, I know, you won it in a Superman look-alike contest!"

"What? Who?" He shook his head. "If you absolutely must know I won it in a game of sabacc."

"Sabacc?"

And then he told her all about sabacc, which seemed to be some kind of extreme, outer-space poker, that apparently also could tell the future and probably find pots of gold at the end of rainbows too if Calrissian was to be believed. (Forgive her for being slightly sceptical.)

"Like this." He flipped the top card over. "It's the Commander of Staves. It means, sort of, 'a messenger on a fool's errand'." He grinned widely, as if it was some kind of private joke. "That's me, I guess."

He made a great show of picking another card. He was probably cheating somehow. He seemed the type. But then that intolerable grin disappeared and his face became unreadable when he finally turned it over. The card showed an object next to a blue planet and text on the bottom that said 'the Satellite'.

"What does it mean?" she asked.

"Nothing important," he said quickly. "Let's do you instead. A traveller from far away - must be more interesting than my boring old life."

"All right." She picked a card, turning it over to reveal a six with swords on the top.

"The Six of Sabres." He smiled. "A journey's end."

Donna didn't much like the sound of that. She had no intention of letting her journey end here, not now, not _ever_ and especially not with Mr Smooth here.

"It's not a bad card," he said at her unhappy look. "Every journey has an end. That's how the universe works, honey."

"Don't call me that," she huffed and picked another card. This time it portrayed a burning space ship. "Well?"

Lando didn't answer at first, and when he did it was with a dismissive gesture. "It's not for real anyway," he said. "Just a way to pass time. Pick another one."

Oh no, just her luck. "I picked the flipping _death_ card, didn't I?"

"No, no, it isn't! That's another card. This is... not that." The way he said it made it sound like this card was actually worse than the death card.

"Just tell me what it means. It's not like I believe in this anyway."

He sighed. "Fine. The most common interpretation is disaster and destruction, and generally bad, bad things. Happy now?"

"What, for once a card isn't vague and cryptic, and it means the bloody apocalypse?"

"_Not_ the apocalypse. Just pick another card, start again."

"No!" Donna said and quickly gathered the cards, pushing them back towards him. "You just predicted that my future is going to be all badness and destruction, I don't want to know what else you can fit in there. I'm just going to go back to my room and sleep."

He certainly knew how to kill her good mood.

* * *

6.

Donna was walking back to level 174 in the dark, when a familiar sound reached her ears. Her breath hitched. It was the most _beautiful_ sound in the world.

She didn't waste any time.

Rounding a corner, she ran straight into the Doctor, almost knocking him to the ground. Breathless, she grabbed his arms, keeping him on his feet. Torn between the urge to hug him and to slap him silly, she ended up just clutching tightly at his arms. "Where have you been? I didn't, I thought you'd... it's been _weeks_!"

"Really?" The Doctor smiled brightly. "Only a couple of minutes for me. Well, I was in a hurry, my aim might have been a bit off. But you got a holiday! You said you wanted one of those."

"Holiday?! I had to work!"

She was going to tell him, in every excruciating detail, about everything she had to live through because he couldn't bloody drive to save his life, but first things first. She was dying for a cup of coffee.

* * *

7.

The incident would soon be known as That Time the Doctor Ruthlessly Abandoned (Don't Even Try to Explain it Away) Donna Noble, For Which He Will Owe Her For the Rest of His Bloody Martian Life.

First cash-in: The Chocolate Planet. Which wasn't really what it was called, but what Donna would remember it as, for obvious, _delicious_ reasons.

* * *

8.

It was much later, after the Library, after Lee, after Rose whispered two words in her ear, after Davros and after Bad Wolf Bay; time slowed down while her thoughts rushed forward so fast she couldn't keep up. Every picosecond held a universe of their own, and her mind was hers and his and hers, blended together in the most excruciatingly perfect constellation of firing synapses... the Doctor's fingers on her temples were cool and she remembered, he remembered, the rules of sabacc, he'd played it before, oh yes, Time Lords, so much knowledge hidden, the Empire and the Rebel Alliance, the messenger on a fool's errand and the Satellite - a betrayal. If there had been time before the Doctor took it all away, she would have smiled, because she knew it all worked out fine in the end. For him.

It wasn't looking so good for her.

Destruction and disaster, yes. A journey's end. Every journey had an end, that was how the universe worked. Question was, what came next? Darkness descended; she held onto one last sliver of the universe.

Turn over another card and start again.

**Author's Note:**

> The details about sabacc cards are shamelessly stolen from the novel _Lando Calrissian and the Mindharp of Sharu_.


End file.
